The invasive generosity of Budapest and Bucharest

“Kiev is beginning to have serious problems with its neighbours,” writes the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta, reporting on Ukraine’s annoyance with the granting of passports to its Hungarian and Romanian nationals, notably those in the western part of Ukraine. Despite the prohibition on dual nationality in Ukraine the practice is growing, especially as “the requirements for obtaining a Romanian passport and Hungarian are minimal: the applicant must prove his roots [ethnic Romanian or Hungarian] or show that his family had lived in territories that were once part of Romania and Hungary, particularly before the Second World War.”

This “individual integration into the EU” should be a warning to the government, which, incapable of solving social and economic problems, could see “hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians obtain foreign citizenship” the Russian newspaper warns. But the real threat that’s emerging is separatism, since Kiev can “lose control over the territories inhabited by the foreign nationals,” Nezavisimaya Gazeta adds, quoting the Ukrainian expert Alexander Gavrich: “For separation, it’s enough that the slogans of cultural belonging be transformed into political demands.”